| WASHINGTON
- December 7 - Officers of the Green Party of the
United States have just returned from meetings in
Europe with legislators and other officials who are
members of various European Green Parties. Meanwhile,
Green activist Medea Benjamin, founder of the
non-profit organization Global Exchange and 2000 Green
Party candidate for U.S. Senator from California, and
three other women from Global Exchange recently
returned from a fact-finding trip to Afghanistan and
Pakistan. On Thursday, December 6, they released a
report describing their findings and offering
recommendations to the Bush Administration about how
to alleviate the suffering of Afghanistan's civilian
population ("Reconstructing Afghanistan: Statement by
Global Exchange Women's Delegation to the Region".)
"The U.S. bombing has created a whole new class of
refugees, most of whom are not receiving any kind of
aid," said Ms. Benjamin. "The U.S. therefore has an
tremendous responsibility to ensure that the refugees
we have created do not die from lack of food. We need
U.N. peacekeepers in Afghanistan now to get food to
people. The U.S. must today end its resistance to an
international peacekeeping force. It is unconscionable
for the U.S. to frustrate humanitarian efforts."
The contingent from Global Exchange has been working
closely with the Revolutionary Association of the
Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), Afghan Womens Mission,
Afghan Womens Council, and Afghan Womens Network, all
of which have demanded that women be included in the
plans for reconstructing Afghanistan and in the Bonn
talks on establishing a new Afghan government.
Annie Goeke, chair of the International Committee of
the Green Party of the United States, Tom Sevigny, a
member of the party's national Steering Committee, and
Green Party Political Coordinator Dean Myerson met
last week with Belgian Green Party Minister Jean Marc
Nollet, a United Nations representative, to discuss
Children's Rights and a campaign to protest the U.S.'s
refusal to sign on to the Child Rights International
Treaty. They also discussed strategies to address
global warming and control carbon dioxide (greenhouse
gas) emissions with Olivier Deleuze, chair of the
European Parliament.
"Green Parties on both sides of the Atlantic have
continued to develop and meetings during this visit
promise to move our cooperation to a new level of
practical coordination to build the Green Party
globally and get real results on Green issues,"
commented Myerson.
"We emphasized to European Greens that they are in a
position to embarrass U.S. government officials for
their inaction or bad policies, and that our own
experience in the U.S. political system can help them
do so, thus getting more results on many issues of
common concern. This is the next step for the Earth's
only global political party to combine the leverage of
European Greens in governmental positions with our
new-found growth and impact to affect U.S. policies in
a way not expected by the elites in the U.S."
Goeke, Sevigny, and Myerson spoke at a public forum
attended by officials from the European Federation of
Green Parties (EFGP) in the Maison des Femmes,
discussing the U.S. Green Party's goals and clarifying
the party's position on the War in Afghanistan:
disagreement with the German Greens' decision under
the leadership of Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer to
support the U.S.'s unilaterally conducted military
strikes; calling for an international court to try the
criminals behind the September 11 attacks in accord
with international law; demand for representation from
Afghan women's organizations in the Bonn talks.
They later met Arnold Cassola, Secretary General for
EFGP, and officials from the European Parliament Green
Group and from the Heinrich Boell Foundation, which
supports and coordinates the Green movement in
Germany. Greens in Europe and the U.S. plan to
participate in the 2nd World Social Forum (WSF) in
Porto Alegre, Brazil, from January 31 to February 5,
2002. About 100,000 people attended the first WSF in
2001, an initiative of international NGOs that
presented a democratic alternative to the
Globalization Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Tom Sevigny represented the U.S. Green Party in
Budapest at the European Federation of Green Parties
Council meeting on international security; Annie Goeke
attended the World Citizen's Assembly conference in
Lille.
MORE INFORMATION
The Green Party of the United States http://gpus.org
Global Exchange http://www.globalexchange.org
Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan http://www.rawa.org
European Federation of Green Parties http://www.europeangreens.org
World Citizens Alliance http://www.alliance21.org
2nd World Social Forum http://www.worldsocialforum.org
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